Travelin' Soldier
by softballqueen219
Summary: The Vietnam War has started and young man named Alfred has been drafted. But as he waits for his ride, he see's a young waitress named Alice in the window. Based on the song "Travelin' Soldier" by the Dixie Chicks. USxFem!UK.


**Disclaimer: I don't own Hetalia or the song "Travelin' Soldier" by the Dixie Chicks.**

 **Also this story had been published before on this account, but has been updated to correct grammar and other mistakes.**

* * *

 **Travelin' Soldier**

* * *

 _Two days past eighteen_ _  
He was waiting for the bus in his army green  
Sat down in a booth in a cafe there  
Gave his order to a girl with a bow in her hair  
He's a little shy so she gives him a smile  
And he said, "Would you mind sittin' down for a while  
And talking to me?  
I'm feeling a little low."  
She said, "I'm off in an hour and I know where we can go."_

* * *

Alfred F. Jones was being drafted and, by God, was he not looking forward to at all. He had heard stories from his boss about the men coming back home and how they weren't the same. He just prayed that that didn't happened to him.

He was currently sitting in front of a local café waiting for his bus to come, dressed in his army uniform. He glanced into the café and saw a girl with two blonde pigtails with a green bow in her hair, taking an order from an elderly couple with a smile that shined through her emerald green eyes. Her smile and slight ancient made Alfred's interest immediately peak and he grabbed his bags and rushed into the café.

He sat down in one of booths and waited patiently for the girl. The blonde came asked what he would like to drink. The kind solider just said that he didn't want anything but just to talk and he explained his situation. After a moment, the girl with the bow in her hair smiled softly and said she knows a place that they could talk and just wait an hour because that is when her shift is over.

* * *

 _So they went down and they sat on the pier_ _  
He said I bet you got a boyfriend but I don't care  
I got no one to send a letter to  
Would you mind if I sent one back here to you_

* * *

The pair quietly walked down to a pier nearby after the girl, who identified herself as Alice, got off work. The silence was comfortable as they walked and the two teens just enjoyed each other's company. They conversed about their lives and such as time went on. Alfred told her about how he was the star quarterback in high school and Alice told him that she had moved to America when she was a little girl from London, explaining why she had a slight accent.

For hours they talked and just pretended to have a sense of normalcy, until the sun set on the horizon, signifying Alfred's time to go. Before he left, however, Alfred couldn't fathom as to why Alice didn't have a boyfriend but decided he didn't care. He asked her if he could send her letters since he didn't have anyone to write to. She agreed and took a piece of paper out of her pocket and wrote her address on it and told him to feel free to write as much as he wanted.

Never before had Alfred's smile been so bright.

* * *

 _So the letters came from an army camp_

 _In California then Vietnam  
And he told her of his heart  
It might be love and all of the things he was so scared of  
He said, "When it's getting kinda rough over here,  
I think of that day sittin' down at the pier.  
And I close my eyes and see your pretty smile.  
Don't worry but I won't be able to write for awhile."_

* * *

Months passed and the two grew more and more close by the letters sent back forth. At first Alfred talked about this training in California and how he was starting to grow afraid of what was to come. Alice talked about things back at home and reassured him that everything was going to be all right and he would be home soon. As time went on, the two become so close that it was borderline falling in love. He confessed that when things got hard and he felt he was going to break down, he thought about the time on the pier and how her smile gets him though almost anything, and he said he had fallen in love with a girl.

Angered that he would tell her such a thing and then say he was in love with someone, Alice wrote a stern letter telling him that she had fallen in love with someone too, trying to make him jealous, clueless that is was her he was talking about. When Alfred had received the letter he had laughed so hard and saw through what she was doing. He quickly wrote to her saying it was she who he had fallen head over heels for and that the letters wouldn't be as frequent as he was heading over to Vietnam soon. And so began their changing from friends to lovers.

* * *

 _I cried_ _  
Never gonna hold the hand of another guy  
Too young for him they told her  
Waitin' for the love of a travelin' soldier  
Our love will never end  
Waitin' for the soldier to come back again  
Never more to be alone when the letter said  
A soldier's coming home_

* * *

Weeks passed between letters and Alice found herself getting more and more worried about the love of her life's safety. She tried to express her worries to her friends and family, but they said she was too young to fall in love at the age of 16 and was foolish to wait for a dead man walking. She cried and prayed for him to safely return every night, for their love will never end. She wanted her traveling solider, her Alfred, to come back home. She hated this feeling of a piece missing from her, especially when she saw couples to her school and even more so when she was asked out on dates by the notorious player, Francis. She waited day after day, week after week, for the letter saying he was coming home.

But it never came.

* * *

 _One Friday night at a football game_ _  
The Lord's Prayer said and the Anthem sang  
A man said, "Folks would you bow your heads  
For a list of local Vietnam dead."  
Crying all alone under the stands  
Was a piccolo player in the marching band  
And one name read but nobody really cared  
But a pretty little girl with a bow in her hair_

* * *

The principle of Freedom High school Walked onto the field looking quite somber. He spoke in to microphone asking for a moment of silence as the names of the local fallen soldiers of Vietnam began to be read to the crowd. Only certain people paid any attention to the list of the dead, particularly a girl with a green bow. She quietly slipped from her position in the marching band to under the bleachers, clutching her piccolo, and crying as his name was read of the list. And she prayed that the letter she receive a few weeks ago was a mistake and that her hero was still alive.

* * *

 _I cried_ _  
Never gonna hold the hand of another guy  
Too young for him they told her  
Waitin' for the love of a travelin' soldier  
Our love will never end  
Waitin' for the soldier to come back again  
Never more to be alone when the letter said  
A soldier's coming home_

* * *

Months passed and soon the anniversary of Alice's meeting with her loved one came by. After her shift from work ended, she rode her bike to the local flower shop and bought some roses. When the young Italian, who worked the shop with her older sister and grandfather, asked whom they were for, Alice replied with, "A traveling soldier" and left.

The blonde with a bow in her hair rode her bike down to the pier and sat on the edge. She talked to the water like it was Alfred and told her of what her life was like without him. She talked about she had kept all of his letters and read every single one religiously, praying that is was him and he would come home soon. But after a few weeks, it started to sink in that he wasn't coming home and he would never be. She told him of how she had been accepted into Cambridge early and she was going to be leaving in the spring. She talked and talked until the tears started to fall and she threw the flowers in the water and said goodbye to her traveling soldier and turned to good home. She walked into something hard and felt arms circle around her and hold her close. She knew who this was from the moment he held her close and felt completely safe as her traveling soldier spoke the words:

"I am home."


End file.
